JULIA BOIX-VIVES
The Netherlands

🎉14/08/1970

EDUCATION
2022-2024
Master of Arts in Visual Arts, Jewellery Design & Gold and Silversmithing, PXL University, Hasselt, Belgium. 

2016-2020
Contemporary Jewellery, Royal Academy of fine arts, Antwerp, Belgium.

2014-2017
Jewellery techniques, De Wiele Geldrop, Smeltkroes, Eindhoven, The Netherlands.

2004
Training in Special Effects Multimedia, Les Gobelins, Paris, France.

1994-1997
Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Sculpture (Post-Master) Germany.

1989-1994
Ecole d’Art (Grenoble Fine Arts School), DNSEP (Master’s degree), Grenoble, France.

1987-1991
Drama Conservatory, Chambéry and Grenoble, France.

MEET THE ARTIST

Which step in your process goes unnoticed but is absolutely essential?

What I dream about, or what I think about whilst half-awake, those ideas that come to me then,
those obsessions that go round and round in my head until early morning. With a flash of clarity.
Yes, that’s what I want; that’s what it means. It’s part of my creative process; it’s very personal and
it’s essential.

Which materials do you enjoy working with the most, and why?

I love hammering copper and shaping it under the hammer, I find it magical. I love the
colours it takes on when I heat it, and its suppleness, its warmth and its energy.

Do you work more intuitively or according to a plan?

100 % intuitively!

Who or what has influenced your style the most?

Adi Toch, David Huycke, kadri Mälk, Alexander Calder but also Joseph Beuys, Man Ray, Giuseppe Penone...

Do you remember the first piece of jewellery you ever bought or collected?
A ring featuring a nude female body.

Do you wear jewellery every day? Why or why not?

Yes always 2 rings or three, indian plastic bracelet, earings and my gold baptismal medal worn upside down

ABOUT JULIA

Julia Boix-Vives’ practice moves between sculpture, performance, and jewellery, in a constant dialogue between forms, gestures, and sensory perceptions. She considers the body as a living, evolving space. Her turn to jewellery is not driven by ornament, but by a shift in scale and intimacy.
Inspired by the ritual of a woman in front of her mirror, she subverts its codes with humor and sensuality. Gesture becomes central: tapping, rubbing, caressing, extracting, choreographic actions oscillating between care, desire, and self-performance. Her pieces combine beauty accessories, sponges, powder puffs, brushes, exfoliating nets, with precious metals and stones.
Like a contemporary Powder Room, her work creates a hybrid space where identities are recomposed and gender is re-enacted. jewellery becomes a portable stage, a site of dialogue between personal mythologies, imaginaries, and embodied experiences.

EXHIBITION HIGHLIGHTS

  • 2026 Sensitive Cartographies - Parcours Bijoux - Paris.
  • 2026 Transylvania Jewelry Festival, Cluj-Napoca (RO).
  • 2026 Closet, cabinets and containers of secrets - The Warehouse, Amsterdam.             
  • 2026 Magic Mirror on the Wall – DIVA Museum, Antwerp (BE).

  • 2026 Munich Jewellery Week (DE)
The Fragile Body + All In – The Warehouse + J is for Jewellery.

  • 2026 AMBERIF International Fair of Amber & Jewellery – Gdańsk (PL).                                     
  • 2026 On the Open Waters – Dutch Pavilion
Puyuan International Contemporary Jewellery Art & Design Biennale (CN).
  • 2025 OBSESSED! Jewellery Festival – Amsterdam and Antwerp.
    - Stories and Gestures – Liesbeth den Besten’s house (duo exhibition with Triin Kukk).                         
    - The Full House – The Warehouse, Amsterdam.

    - At this point - PXL-MAD takes over DIVA Museum Antwerp.
  • Cocks and Cunt – The Warehouse, Amsterdam (NL).
  • Chaos & Control - Precious Collective, Munich Jewellery Week (DE).
  • Piece of Peace - The Warehouse, Munich Jewellery Week (DE).
  • 2025 Transylvania Jewelry Festival, Cluj-Napoca (RO).
  • 2024 Object & Jewellery Turns 30 – PXL-MAD School of Arts, Hasselt (BE).
  • 2024 Marzee International Graduate Show – Galerie Marzee, Nijmegen (NL).

  • 2024 Exit & Exit Extended – CCHA & Galerie Multiple, Hasselt.
  • 2024 Brussels Jewellery Week – PARTICLE.
  • 2024
Amber Trip – Vilnius (LT) – awarded for innovative use of materials.

EXTRA :)

Julia and me (Juan) during Munich Jewelry Week 2025 at the Pinakothek der Moderne. Happy to see each other again, both wearing a subtle necklace we each made ourselves.